The Ring Magazine's Annual Ratings: 1992 As selected by The Ring magazine in April 1993 issue. Pound For Pound 1. Julio Cesar Chavez 2. Pernell Whitaker 3. Terry Norris 4. Orlando Canizales 5. James (Buddy) McGirt 6. Riddick Bowe 7. Azumah Nelson 8. Sung-Kil Moon 9. Julian Jackson 10. James Toney I was looking at the General Forum posts and there was discussion of the current pound for pound rankings. It just so happens I have been recently going through old lists and rankings and articles from the older times and figured I'd post this '92 pound for pound list. The memories that flood back make me feel like I did as a teenager, waiting for the magazines to be released (no internet) so we could see who was ranked on the list. Just the names and the order they appear tells a thousand words each. Wonderful times! I remember how heated the debates became over who deserved the top spot on the list. Chavez was seen as the true pound for pound king at the gym I trained at (predominantly Mexicans), and the sparring sessions got a little more heated during the month the rankings were released as others maintained that Whitaker was more deserving of the top spot. As if our gym wars proved the truth of the matter in the least! Kind of a twist on the old playground days of "my dad can beat up your dad", "no he couldn't", "yes he could"; then the fists started flying, both our dad's hard at work in their offices not even knowing they were the topic of a playground dispute, much less wanting to duke it out with the other mentioned dad... Hindsight tells a different story on the rankings than did living through it, as will someday be the case for our current pound for pound lists. I have good memories of those days. Anyone else remember that grand debate over Chavez and Whitaker? Or bruised a knuckle or nose over the matter in the gym?
Great stuff. I can picture those heated debates, and unlike nowadays, those two would face off later that year. As a side note, it's amazing that Sweet Pea has wins (essentially) over 3 of that top 10, and all 4 wins not far removed from when these rankings were made.
Oh no, this just can't be true. To read some things here, Julio was very much on the downslide by then.
